The Card – Volume XXXVIII

by Gary Williams | May 5, 2024 | The Card

18 observations, thoughts and predictions for the week in golf…

1. Brooks Koepka winning the LIV golf event in Singapore can represent whatever level of accomplishment you choose to make it, but it likely signifies a more competitive Koepka at the PGA Championship.  Brooks spoke of his own disappointment at his performance at the Masters which is a self-motivating strategy that has always proved effective for Koepka.  A win at Valhalla would be bold type in the historical record.  Back-to-Back PGA’s for the second time would equal the accomplishment of Tiger Woods who won in 1999 and 2000 and again in 2006 and 2007.  It would also signify his fourth Wannamaker trophy tying him with Tiger Woods and putting him one behind the all-time leaders of Jack Nicklaus and Walter Hagan with five PGA Championship victories.  Finally, if he were to win in Louisville it would be major championship number six, equaling the likes of Mickelson, Faldo, and Trevino in the grand pantheon.  Koepka is a significant storyline at Valhalla.

2. The absence of Scottie Scheffler from the Wells Fargo Championship is not surprising and not alarming as it relates to his chances to win the PGA Championship.  In his 10 tour wins, including both major wins, Scheffler took at least one week off before those victories and in the case of both wins at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, he had taken a couple weeks off after the west coast swing.  The break for the birth of the first child for Scottie and his wife Meredith may prove to be exactly what he needed beyond the enrichment of their lives headed into the major sprint.

3. Tiger Woods received the least surprising thing this week, a special exemption into the U.S. Open at Pinehurst.  In the wasteland of social media there were suggestions and opinions that Woods should have to go through sectional qualifying.  Those opinions are from those who are either uniformed or are trolling.  Neither way is the best way to go through life.  Jack Nicklaus received eight exemptions into the U.S. Open culminating with his last start at Pebble Beach in 2000.  Arnold Palmer received five exemptions into the U.S. Open with the last coming at Oakmont, poignantly in 1994.  Icons get the invite to the championship they helped make in their prime.  Additionally, Scott Verplank, David Ishee, Jay Sigel, and Aaron Baddeley received special exemptions into America’s oldest major and people are questioning Tiger Woods getting his first exemption?  Get used to it because, like Nicklaus, the passes will continue likely until his final one in 2032 at Pebble Beach where his first U.S. Open win occurred by 15 shots in 2000. 

4. The Cognizant Founders Cup on the LPGA has some real juice this week as Nelly Korda pursues her sixth straight win.  Upper Montclair Golf Club is a charming spot in Clifton, NJ.  The Sopranos shot scenes there through the years and the place has tournament history with Gene Littler winning the first ThunderBird Classic in 1962.  Lee Trevino, Nancy Lopez, Lorena Ochoa, Pat Bradley and Arnold Palmer have also won at Upper Montclair.  First pitches at Yankee Stadium from a couple players this past weekend kicked off the promotional blitz and Nelly changes the game on the assignment desk at the New York papers.  Her streak gives buzz and the New York media, while covered up with Rangers playoff hockey and Knicks playoff basketball, will give an increased amount of column space to Korda and the field.  There is nothing like winning in North Jersey!

5. Anthony Kim is now five events into his return to professional golf and he’s yet to have a week that signifies quantitative progress.  He’s finished 50^th or worse in every event including this past week in Singapore where he finished 53^rd out of 54 players.  His stats are at the absolute bottom of every important category including fairways hit, less than 40% and greens hit in regulation, less than 50%.  I said from the beginning that the whole season would give an indicator if he can ascend legitimately to a lofty place again and the results so far should surprise no one including Anthony himself.  A generation of players has come and gone since he last competed and the end then was not good.  He appears happy and grateful but his insistence on engaging people on social media who are carving him up is the definition of wasted energy.  Enjoy sobriety, your family, this opportunity to play again and leave the agita behind.

6. I was able to see the renovation to the Finley Golf Course at the University of North Carolina this past week.  The Tarheel men’s team is the number 1 seed in the regional being contested there this coming week in the NCAA championships.  Having played the golf course regularly in the early 90’s it’s a great new chapter for the teams, students and residents of Chapel Hill.  A new putting course, “The Heel”, a robust practice area for the teams with short game and multiple tees and the renovation of the golf course by Carolina alum Davis Love III and his brother Mark give Finley all the assets to compete with the best college facilities in the country.  In a sport void of economic impact on the bottom line of an athletic budget, golf is blessed with insane support from the private sector made up of golf loving alums.

7. Miles Russell made a Korn Ferry Tour cut a few weeks ago at age 15 and this week it was 16-year-old Kris Kim from Surrey, England who made the cut on a sponsor exemption at the CJ Cup Byron Nelson.  Kim is the Boys amateur champion and beat Russell in a Junior Ryder Cup singles match 5 and 4.  This coming week, Blades Brown, a 16-year-old from Nashville, TN gets his shot on a sponsor exemption into the new Myrtle Beach tour event that is opposite the Wells Fargo Championship.  Brown has an NIL deal with Transcend Capital Advisors who have harvested NIL deals with other top college and amateur talent.  Brown is a top target for every major college program and look to make it three juniors making professional cuts in the last month.  Totally insane.

8. The news this week that Jack Nicklaus played Augusta National three times after the Masters is sensational.  Michael Jordan is not playing pick up at old Chicago Stadium, and Joe Montana is not throwing seam routes to Jerry Rice at Candlestick Park.  Neither venue even exists anymore which amplifies the point about golf allowing all of us to be romantic about the greats including the greats taking these walks.  In a classic Nicklaus humble brag moment, he shared dismissingly that he posted rounds of 88, 90, and 91.  He’s 84 years old!!  Maybe, yes sir!

9. Phil Mickelson responded this week to a post on Twitter/X about the perceived challenges for LIV players and major championship starts with the following, “maybe some LIV players won’t be missed.  But what if NONE of the LIV players played?  Would they be missed?  What about next year when more great players join?  Or the following year?  At some point they will care and will have to answer to sponsors and television.  FAAFO”.  Here is what won’t happen… Jon Rahm and Brooks Koepka in the prime of their careers with finite major championship starts in the grand scheme are not going to boycott majors so Talor Gooch can get a start.  Rahm and Koepka are not crusading for LIV’s place in golf, they are two dudes who took the cash, would like unification but are not dying on the major vine for other LIV guys.  It’s not to say they won’t show some phony threat to boycott, but they are NOT missing majors for the cause.  Not in this lifetime.

10. Bandon Dunes resort celebrated their 25^th anniversary this past week with the inclusion of golf “influencers” and the men responsible for the design of the five courses and Bandon Preserve and the new “Shorty’s” offering.  Bandon Dunes ushered in the era of retail golf at outposts from the Cabot Properties, Streamsong and Sand Valley to name a few.  Mike Keiser, the visionary for Bandon Dunes NEEDS to be enshrined into the World Golf Hall of Fame.  In addition to creating foundations at Bandon Dunes to turn profit into charity for conservation and community through several of their assets like Bandon Preserve and Shorty’s he’s driven a sector of the industry well into the future.  Job creation for designers, golf professionals, agronomists, service workers and administrative positions.  More importantly, he’s literally helped bring joy through the game to hundreds and hundreds of thousands of golfers.  He’s a true pioneer in the game and his place in the 2026 HOF class is overdue.

11. The Signature Series comes to Charlotte this week and the swan song for the Wells Fargo Championship.  Wells Fargo, according to multiple sources, offered to renew their agreement with the PGA Tour for more than 20 million dollars annually and the Tour declined.  From the inception of the event, then the Wachovia Championship, the tour has been blessed with the consistency of a presenting sponsor and Quail Hollow Club as a venue except in years that conflicted with a PGA Championship and the Presidents Cup.  It’s widely believed that beyond the PGA Championship in 2025 the tour will return to Quail Hollow with a new sponsor, likely to be announced in the coming weeks.  What is certain is that Quail Hollow, its new sponsor clearly paying north of 20 million annually and the relationship between the Harris family and the powers within the PGA Tour will keep the event, which started in 2003, as an elevated/signature/designated event into the 2030’s.  Charlotte likes the big event, Charlotte can’t count on its local teams to win, period, and golf is a big draw in the market.  It has been from day one.

12. Jordan Spieth’s fourth missed cut in his last six starts is beyond disconcerting.  The lingering issues with the partially torn tendon sheath in his left wrist have prompted calls from broadcast analysts for Jordan to shut it down for a while or possibly face surgery.  Spieth sags into May with no form, no record at Quail Hollow other than a good team week in 2022 with Justin Thomas in the Presidents Cup and his prospects of completing the career grand slam at the PGA at Valhalla seeming beyond remote.  Spieth is a sticky player.  He plays well and the audience sticks around.  The tour currently has few of them and his current state of play is a downer for the PGA Tour C-suite.

13. The passing of Peter Oosterhuis the day before his 76^th birthday this past Thursday conjured sadness from all corners.  Peter played globally, broadcast for virtually every media partner of the main tours and created friendships at all levels of the golf community.  I was fortunate to conduct many interviews with Peter in the infancy of “Morning Drive” on Golf Channel at the beginning of the last decade.  Warm, thoughtful, deferential and exceedingly humble was his make-up.  He exuded grace and nobody took a bad view of Peter.  What a dignified journey and truly gone too early as a victim of the hideous destruction of Alzheimer’s disease.  God speed good sir.

14. Adrian Otaegui won the Volvo China Open for his 5^th win on the DP World Tour.  Couple odd notes about Otaegui and the event.  It’s the first time the DP World Tour has been back to China in five years and for Otaegui it gets him into the PGA Championship as he sneaks into the top 3 in the Asian Swing standings on the DP tour which brings with it an invite to Valhalla.  Sebastian Soderberg led the Asian swing standings punctuated by another top 5.  Soderberg will be making his first start in the PGA.  Soderberg won the 2019 European Masters in Switzerland in one of my all-time favorite gangsome playoffs.  The playoff included Soderberg, Kalle Samooja, Andres Romero, Lorenzo Gagli, and RORY MCILROY!!  Yes, Rory off his Tour Championship and FedEx Cup title the previous week in Atlanta jetted to Switzerland to satisfy a sponsor commitment with Omega and couldn’t quite cross the line in what is one of the great golf geek trivia questions of all time.  Name the five players in the European Masters in 2019?  After that name the six guys in the playoff at Riviera in 2001.  

15. Why doesn’t an event in professional golf build or rebuild their brand around the regal optics of the Kentucky Derby.  Golf is in a tremendous and interesting place regarding fashion and style.  More brands are entering the space with influencers and players driving the interest.  Most people like a costume party and this crosses all demographics.  All sporting events generations ago were attended in elegant and dignified garb.  Taking an event and making it an event should be more than just a signature beverage.  How golf doesn’t have one event where it’s about what you wear is a loss.

16. Jake Knapp had another very good week on tour.  Jake is a good watch outside of his too methodical “think box” approach.  His easy speed, absence of violence at impact, soft soling of the club at address and overall appearance is a cool thing.  He will be interesting to watch through the summer to see if he can build a case for Montreal.

17. The news that Sweetens Cove will close at the end of May for the summer is a tough choice for their team.  The harshness of a winter spell did such damage to their turf that they have made the decision to re-grass and re-open at the beginning of September.  One of the true fun factories will be sorely missed amongst its legion of devotees. See ya in September.

18. The 5 Clubs PGA Championship Preview Show Part 1 will be released on Monday on all of our platforms including our YouTube channel.  Access via our website www.5Clubsgolf.com and on all digital audio platforms.